Social Game Soapbox: Pop-Ups and News Feed Noise

“How many pop-ups is too many pop-ups?” asks the Frisky Mongoose. Shouldn’t there be a more reasonable cap on pop-up notifications, so players can get busy playing (and spending money, for that matter)? Log-in interruptions are particularly bothersome in my opinion, but some games are offering smoother entry these days, so I’ll just assume that’s been noted and move along…

Beyond logging in, when you finally do get to tend to your social game goings-on, it seems like there’s a pop-up every 3-4 clicks. I have hundreds of trees on my farm, and if I want to harvest them all one-by-one, I should be able to without having an annoying pop-up in my face after every 4 trees!

No – I don’t want to send free gifts to my neighbors right now. If I did, I’d click on that enormous Gifts tab staring me in the upper eye. No – I don’t want to check out the new virtual items. If I do, I’ll go to the store.

For games with such simple play mechanics, it just seems downright unreasonable to interrupt the only real “gameplay” you offer. It’s almost like you’re playing a FPS (think Halo or Call of Duty), and the developers randomly throw a pop-up notification during an important battle sequence. Sure, social game pop-ups aren’t going to leave any casualties, but they still disrupt my gameplay experience all the same.

My humble suggestion? Change the gameplay for more experienced players so they don’t have to deal with an entry-level info dump every session. We know already.

Even outside the game – I guess I mistakenly thought the Facebook Games tab reorganization would eliminate news feed notification noise. Nope. Time to revisit the news feed rant…

Have we crossed the line between social and spam yet? Facebook game notices in your news feed are like the new high-tech pocket protector – sure to repel friends at every sighting. I like playing, but not so much that I’m willing to alienate my friends who don’t care that I found free fuel on the farm today. Some people create dummy Facebook accounts to conduct their social gaming (and not to annoy friends), but that’s not even technically allowed in the site’s TOS.

What’s a rule-abiding user to do? I don’t know the answer, but I do hope social game developers can overcome this tightrope before players give up the balancing act and jump off for good. Being a geek is one thing, but being a social network spammer is totally uncool.

This article was originally published on Frisky Mongoose.

25 Brain Games from the Social, Mobile and Casual Space

Back to school already? Here are 25 games that will get your brain in shape before you know it. Even if you’re not headed back to the classroom, we can all use a good mental push up (and a fun distraction) from time to time.

Frisky Mongoose has compiled a list of 25 top titles for “brainstream” gamers both young and old. Did your favorites make the list? poweRBrands and Empire Avenue are 2 of our favorites, simple because they offer something totally unique and relevant for PR and marketing folks like us. Several – if not most – of these social, mobile and casual games are free, so put on your smarty pants and play learn your hearts out!

Facebook games:

poweRBrands by Reckitt Benckiser – “The first Facebook game of its kind, designed to test players’ marketing and business abilities, teach strategy and decision-making skills, and introduce users to the culture and challenges that face the company’s marketers every day.

Brain Buddies by wooga – Brain Buddies offers its users a playful way to determine their brain weight. The game is focusing on a contest among friends to find the one with the heaviest brain. A large set of mini games as well as entertaining graphics make the game fun to play for a long time.

Who Has the Biggest Brain by Playfish – A series of mini games test your abilities in 4 brain areas: Calculation, Memory, Logic and Visual. The combined score from each of these categories add up to your overall brain rating. A great opportunity to settle the debate, who really does have the biggest brain? After playing you are awarded a ranking – one of 27 different ‘Brain Types’ used to rank you and your friends.

Two other studious selections to try from Playfish are Word Challenge and Geo Challenge.

DumbVille by GSN – Tackle quirky questions and puzzle your way through mindless mini-games to rise through the ranks from Village Idiot to Mayor of Dumbville. Every time you succeed AND every time your friends fail, you’ll win Oodles – redeemable rewards that you can use to purchase sweepstakes entries and prizes on GSN.com.

Scrabble by Electronic Arts – A new version of the original board game includes built-in chat and dictionary, multiple word lists, dynamic animations, and multiple speed settings for public games. An easy-to-use interface lets you play with anyone who loves the game!

Online games:

Empire Avenue – Reap the benefits of expanding your online influence while buying and selling virtual shares in your best friend, your favorite blogger or that pizza joint down the road – anyone, for free. Connect with other people who like the same things as you, find interesting bloggers to follow, or unearth a cool new business in your home town! This Internet thing is pretty useful, you know, and Empire Avenue helps you find the people and businesses that are relevant to you.

Risk: The Game of Global Domination on Pogo.com – Establish your military objectives, take command of your army and begin your campaign to rule the world. Based on the classic board game of strategic conquest from Hasbro, Risk comes to life online where the object of the game is simple: Global Domination! Risk is a turn based game with each player starting with their own controllable army in an attempt to capture territories from opposing players and control the entire map.

Word Whomp on Pogo.com – This freebie challenges you to whomp adorable gophers and spell as many words as you can from a given set of letters before the clock runs out. Gophers will dig up veggies and bonuses as you unscramble words. Reach the carrot to enter the bonus round and score big!

Jeopardy on GSN.com – Test your trivia knowledge, just like the actual game show. Select a question from one of the six game categories by clicking on a dollar value under the category of your choice. When the question appears, you may choose to either “Respond” or “Pass.” If you choose to respond, you will have 15 seconds to answer a multiple-choice question. The game will end when you don’t have enough money to play on.

Wheel of Fortune on GSN.com – You can compete for cash and prizes, just like contestants on the actual game show, with 5 turns to solve the word puzzle. Correctly identify consonants or “buy a vowel.” Each successful guess gives you an additional free spin, but the faster you solve the puzzle, the higher your time bonus! When you choose to solve the puzzle, if your answer is correct, you’ll play in the Bonus Round. If not, you’ll lose a turn.

Tiny Planets – “Targetting kids aged six to 14, this game is based on the Tiny Planets animated TV series, and offers six ‘planets’ for users to visit consisting of simple games, web videos, social networking, a virtual world, goods, and currency, and, of course, learning opportunities. Tiny Planets is rich with entertaining and educational activities that focus on space, conservation, science, creativity, and critical thinking skills.”

FitBrains.com – Provides scientifically developed brain games targeting the five major brain areas: memory, problem solving, concentration, visual spatial, Language. Focus on one brain area or play all the games to give your brain a complete workout. Brain games are a fun way to exercise your brain and an important pillar in living a healthy life. Try your luck and test your skills in games like Travel Quest, Sum Snap and Uber Brain.

Fantage.com, a TriplePoint client – A next-generation destination site for children that offers games and adventures to entertain, delight, and promote positive social interaction in an engaging, exciting, safe environment that both kids and parents love. Fantage also provides an age-appropriate, safe social networking experience within a fun virtual world.

iPhone & iPad games:

The Oregon Trail by Gameloft – Assume the role of a wagon leader in a side-view journey where your strategic decisions must ensure the safety of your party along the treacherous Oregon Trail. Overcome the perilous journey to Oregon in America’s Wild West. Just like the real pioneers, experience the decision-making, problem-solving, and role-playing fun of this historical event. A unique strategy/educational game relating the first pioneers’ journey to Western American.

THINK by TriplePoint client, Ravensburger Digital – 16 exercises spread across four distinct categories, all designed to give your mind a rigorous workout in different areas of thought. THINK is currently available in English, Spanish and German. Could your brain use a boost?

RedFish Puzzle by Fresh Planet – “Fun games for smart people.” Fresh Planet offers several brain games on various platforms, including the RedFish series of learning apps for young children on the iPad. RedFish Piano 4 Kids is another good one to check out.

Words with Friends by Newtoy Inc. – Turn-based crossword gaming in your pocket! Not much else to say, besides this game is Scrabble in your pocket, with your friends, in real time… and it’s as addictive as they come.

HexaLex by TriplePoint client, Nathan Gray – Takes the classic, easy to learn but hard to master crossword game and adds a new dimension. Hexagonal tiles let you play words in three directions instead of two. Words interact in new and interesting ways. But have no fear, you’ll be up and playing in no time, thanks to the tutorial and detailed, built-in help. If you’ve ever played Scrabble, Lexulous, or Words With Friends you’ll feel right at home!

Word Warp by MobilityWare – Word game fans rejoice! Similar to Text Twist, Word Warp is a challenging anagram type of word game in which you try to form as many words as you can out of the six letters you are given before time runs out. You will receive points for each correct word, but in order to advance to the next level you must come up with at least one word that uses all six letters.

Word Scramble 2 by Zynga – Scramble is the fast fun game of finding words in a jumbled grid. Quickly slide your finder over letters next to each other to make words! Compete with friends and play live with fellow word game fans.

Nintendo games:

Big Brain Academy (Wii and DS) by Nintendo – Weigh Your Brain! With 15 activities that challenge your brain in single-player Test and Practice modes, Big Brain Academy Wii sees how you measure up in five categories: memory, analysis, number crunching, visual recognition, and quick thinking.

My Word Coach (DS) by Ubisoft – Developed in collaboration with linguists, helps players improve their verbal communication and vocabulary in a fun way. Practice need never get boring with six different exercises to choose between. Players can input missing letters from words, spell out the answers to various definitions, choose which word matches a particular definition, form specific words with Scrabble-like tiles, and more. Three levels of difficulty are available, and the game includes a built-in dictionary of over 17,000 words.

Personal Trainer: Math (DS) by Nintendo – Makes learning fun with fast-paced, high-speed arithmetic problems that keep your math basics fresh, from addition to subtraction and multiplication to division. As your calculation speed improves, earn medals in each exercise to prove your mathematical mastery!

My Virtual Tutor: Reading Kindergarten to 1st Grade (DS) by Mentor Interactive – By combining the kid-friendly Nintendo DS with a proven reading curriculum developed and tested at the University of Colorado, My Virtual Tutor: Reading makes learning reading skills fun, affordable and portable. Through interactive books, school age and grade relevant phonics instruction and fun quiz modes, your child will learn the comprehension, phonics, fluency and vocabulary necessary to become an expert reader, all while having fun with their Nintendo DS.

Brain Age (DS) by Nintendo – The title is a series of minigames designed to give your brain a workout. The 17 engaging activities are all designed to help work your brain and increase blood flow to the prefrontal cortex. Whether you’re playing simple songs on a piano keyboard or monitoring the photo finish of a footrace, you’ll love your new mental workout!

This article was originally published by Kate Hancock on Frisky Mongoose.

Hungry for More Challenge and Chance in Social Games

This weekend over at Frisky Mongoose, I rambled off a lengthy list of reasons why people play social games, and I think its fair to say that Facebook game developers are doing a lot of things right.

Now can they change their click-only interfaces to feed players who are hungry for more?

People will click as many times as they need to make what they want out of a social game. But after all the shopping and buying of virtual items, sending gifts and helping neighbors, harvesting crops, feeding animals, cleaning and decorating… Continue reading Hungry for More Challenge and Chance in Social Games

Facebook Nixes App Notifications, Social Games Get Email Alert Incentives

Now that Facebook apps can no longer send notifications to users, social game developers are implementing new methods of keeping in touch with their players. Here’s an overview of recent game updates from a few top social titles, as reported on FriskyMongoose.com.

First, in case you’ve been under a rock, the background: Facebook notifications will cease to exist in their previous form, starting this week. According to Mashable, developers of games and other Facebook apps will now be required to either send email updates to users (assuming they’ve agreed to receive them), or hope that users will read about their updates via fan pages and new feeds.

An additional counter feature will also be relied on, which displays the number of app related notices you have next to the application’s name in your left menu navigation on the Facebook homepage (for those applications you have bookmarked). However this is as close to universal notifications as the updated system comes, making those who were tired of logging in to see a big 20+ digit in the corner of their screens very happy campers indeed.

One of the most popular new features is an email alert system. Facebook games are rewarding players who register with all kinds of exclusive in-game items, like new recipes, shells and armor. Continue reading Facebook Nixes App Notifications, Social Games Get Email Alert Incentives

Virtual Goods and The New Digital Retail Revolution

Earlier this week, New York City’s Jacob K. Javits Center played host to a convergence of two trade shows, as both the 107th American International Toy Fair and Engage! Expo welcomed a diverse group of exhibitors and speakers.  For certain attendees, the pairing of Toy Fair with the Engage! Expo, a conference that focused primarily on virtual goods, might have at first seemed somewhat out-of-place.  Beyond the giant stuffed animals, puzzle games, and highly popular robotic hamsters that populated much of Toy Fair, Engage! showcased  leading entrepreneurs in the new digital retail phenomenon – the virtual goods industry.

As reported by Inside Network and covered here on TriplePointPR.com, this year, the virtual goods industry is projected to drive $1.6 billion in revenue in the U.S. alone.  While the ability to purchase virtual goods has existed in online communities for quite some time now, the phenomenon that is social gaming hasushered in a brand new audience for microtransaction purchases – the general consumer.

While traditional retailers and toymakers struggle to survive the stormy and rather unpredictable economic recession, the virtual goods industry is booming.  Selling non-physical items, the providers of virtual goods have seen just as much (and presumably more) success than long time brands and veterans of the physical toy industry present at the Javits Center this week.  The reason for such success is simple – the provider of the virtual good, which can be looked upon as a modern toy manufacturer, is smarter and armed with more consumer information than the producer of the antiquated physical retail toy.

Continue reading Virtual Goods and The New Digital Retail Revolution

Facebook and the Fate of Social Gaming in 2010

Facebook Logo

Facebook is staggeringly huge. They have over 400 million active users, half of whom log in on any given day, over 500k active applications, and can rattle off plenty of other impressive totals for those who’d like to listen. As an open platform, they have provided companies like Zynga and PlayFish with millions of dollars in revenue, and provided many other developers with a shot at financial success. Despite these achievements, and despite an estimated company valuation that extends into the billions, monetization remains the one aspect of Facebook’s business that hasn’t matched their growth. With this week’s sure-to-be-critiqued changes, that last piece of the puzzle may be ready to fall into place. But first, a bit of background…

On January 21, a group of the Bay Area’s social gaming forces descended on Google’s Mountain View campus for a panel discussion hosted by Peanut Labs and Google Orkut. The evening was inspired by a post on Three Rings CEO Daniel James’ blog which laid out some predictions for the industry in 2010. The panelists included folks from Zynga, RockYou, PlaySpan, Three Rings, Outspark, and Inside Social Games, and they all seemed eager to share their opinions, even if most kept their cards close to their chest while doing so. As the discussion progressed, one thing became crystal clear: the growth or decline of social gaming in 2010 will rest largely on the shoulders of Facebook.

Specifically, the discussion hinged upon upcoming changes to the way Facebook interacts with applications (changes that are now being put into effect). Prior to this week, any programmer on the planet, given some development time, could make money off of a Facebook game without Facebook earning a single cent. Devs could even use Facebook’s tools to grow their game virally for free, sending messages to users and posting notifications on players’ newsfeeds.

This was, originally, in Facebook’s best interest, since being an open platform helped them attract the attention of thousands of developers. It also meant that Facebook owned all the users these games collected, making the developers reliant on the platform for their successes. This setup worked like a charm, allowing folks like Zynga and PlayFish to reach a huge audience and turn an enormous profit.

Now the folks at Facebook have, understandably, decided they want to monetize the successful system they’ve developed. As a bonus, they’ve also figured out a way to clean things up in the process. The new “games” page borrows heavily from Apple’s app store setup, providing users with lists of the most popular games and info on what their friends are playing. Meanwhile, the recently introduced Facebook Credits will provide users with a universal in-app purchasing system. Finally, once the changes are solidly in place, applications will not be allowed to send notifications directly to their users, cutting down on the “spam” messages that many have complained about over the last year.

Facebook Games Page
(Image courtesy the Facebook Blog)

This promises to make the user experience significantly smoother on Facebook, but it also marks a significant shift in power behind the scenes. By making developers live within the framework they’ve established, Facebook is forcing devs to rely far more heavily on traditional outreach like PR and advertising for growth. Advertising is of particular interest to Facebook, especially when you consider the incredibly valuable ad space they now have to offer on the “games” page. Facebook Credits, meanwhile, will let them take a measure of control over in-app purchases (as well as a small cut of the profits) while solidifying their grip by getting users to tie their credit card info to the platform.

Thus, the new system still provides developers with room for viral growth, but it’s not going to be the rampant, sometimes questionably spammy, growth of the past. Facebook is taking control of the platform, both for their own sake and, ostensibly, for the sake of their users. This could be bad news for the developers who have been really cashing in, but as with Apple’s app store, developers that are willing to play by the rules should still be able to profit handsomely.

At least, that’s what Facebook is hoping. Only time will tell whether this plan will bear fruit or put a chokehold on the rapid growth of social gaming on the platform. Either way, 2010 is going to be interesting times for the social gaming industry!